Rejection of Victorian Social Values and Norms: A Feminist Analysis of Smoke Screens by Harold Brighouse

Abstract

This study takes Harold Brighouse’s play Smoke Screens as its research subject, and conducts analysis from a feminist literary perspective. Building upon the core feminist theories of Virginia Woolf (1929/1938), Simone de Beauvoir (1949), and Kate Millett (1970), this study adopts a research design of qualitative close textual analysis, focuses on several core thematic areas including gender and patriarchy. It unpacks the play’s critique of the social institutions and gender norms of the Victorian era; and verifies that the play’s female characters, who reject traditional identities, subvert the contemporary stereotype that framed women as compliant, dependent beings. The researcher points out that the core of the female protagonist of this literary work’s resistance to economic dependence and patriarchal rule is her choice to reject alimony and live an independent life. To conclude, Smoke Screens illustrates a transition from restrictive Victorian norms toward modern feminist consciousness by portraying women who actively resist dependency and redefine identity through autonomy, mobility, and economic agency.